Monday, March 21, 2011

Ink Shedding on "Stich Bitch"

In "Stich Bitch" Shelley Jackson discusses the idea of whether a part can be as impressive or important as a whole?  She is wondering if the different parts of a whole can be as powerful as the whole itself?  A quote from the text that states this says "...just because I advocate dispersal doesn't mean I'm as impressed by a pile of sawdust as I am by a tree, a ship, a boat."  These "parts" are all connected to create the whole, but indeed they have no direct bearing on a the whole.  Saw dust can be considered boring and a radically fragmented component of a tree.  The beauty of this constraint is the way that a small space can be filed to meet a strict limit.  Another example of a constraint is in our own writing and speaking.  Constraints are a part of our lingual expression whether we know it or not.  We can only make use of 26 letters and our own personal vocabulary.  Although, constraints can limit the creativness of a writer or an artist, they can also help one work faster and push him or herself.  A dancer can dance and create only after learning the constrained form, the technique.  This technique, or constraint, is vital and cannot be ignored or skipped!

1 comment:

  1. “Constraints are a part of our lingual expression whether we know it or not.”

    I agree—wholeheartedly. In thinking about thinking, we can imagine the way our brain would think without language. Or, in the case of people who are polylingual, their brains can think in many different languages—at times, all at once. Does this reveal that language constrains our brains? Definitely. Could we achieve a level of intelligence without it? I don’t think so. That’s the paradox.

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